Considerations for the development of cost‐effective cell culture media for cultivated meat production

Abstract

Innovation in cultivated meat development has been rapidly accelerating in recent years because it holds the potential to help attenuate issues facing production of dietary protein for a growing world population. There are technical obstacles still hindering large‐scale commercialization of cultivated meat, of which many are related to the media that are used to culture the muscle, fat, and connective tissue cells. While animal cell culture media has been used and refined for roughly a century, it has not been specifically designed with the requirements of cultivated meat in mind. Perhaps the most common industrial use of animal cell culture is currently the production of therapeutic monoclonal antibodies, which sell for orders of magnitude more than meat. Successful production of cultivated meat requires media that is food grade with minimal cost, can regulate large‐scale cell proliferation and differentiation, has acceptable sensory qualities, and is animal ingredient‐free. Much insight into strategies for achieving media formulations with these qualities can be obtained from knowledge of conventional culture media applications and from the metabolic pathways involved in myogenesis and protein synthesis. In addition, application of principles used to optimize media for large‐scale microbial fermentation processes producing lower value commodity chemicals and food ingredients can also be instructive. As such, the present review shall provide an overview of the current understanding of cell culture media as it relates to cultivated meat.

Simple and effective serum-free medium for sustained expansion of bovine satellite cells for cell cultured meat

“…It should be noted, however, that significant cost reduction of serum-free media is still needed to make cultured meat production economically viable from an industrial perspective. Here, reducing the cost of albumin, growth factors and basal media (e.g., through the use of plant or algal hydrolysates) will be essential 26,27 . Additionally, co-culture of meat-relevant cells with nutrient-or growth factor-producing cells could offer valuable cost-saving opportunities 28 .…”

“…Indeed, it is possible that media components which appeared inconsequential in this work (e.g., hepatocyte growth factor or ethanolamine) would offer advantages in other permutations of media not tested in the development of Beefy-9. Computational approaches to media development are better suited for solving such multifactorial problems, and should therefore be leveraged to further optimize Beefy-9 and other serum-free media for cultured meat applications 27 . Here, efforts can focus on adipose as well as muscle tissue, for instance through the use of free fatty acid addition to Beefy-9 to induce the transdifferentiation of BSCs into lipid-accumulating cells 31 .…”

Cultivating Multidisciplinarity: Manufacturing and Sensing Challenges in Cultured Meat Production

“…In order to prevent contamination, the standard cell culture procedures routinely use antibiotics and fungicides, albeit in significantly smaller quantities when compared to livestock farming. However, this may not even be necessary for CM, as recent studies show that antibiotics-free cultivation procedures for CM may even be more favorable for the serum-free media adaptation [14,15]. A CM bioprocess that could be implemented without the use of antibiotics and with serum-free media would be considered as a double positive effect, since the major proportion of the costs of CM production comes from the serum-and media-related costs [16].…”

“…The more efficient implementation of the sensors and overall optimization of the CM bioprocess may enable recycling and lower consumption of the medium and serum, while constant efforts are being made to develop a food-grade, animal-product-free medium for CM production [14,15].…”

Editorial: Technological Advances Improving Recombinant Protein Production in Bacteria

“…Among those products, growth factors and hormones have the largest market share; growth factors are signaling proteins that regulate cellular processes involving proliferation, differentiation, inflammation and angiogenesis. Recombinant growth factors have been conventionally used as therapeutics for wound healing and diseases, and they increasingly serve as cosmetic additives and as a supplement in serum-free media for cultivated meats (Kim et al, 2021 ; O'Neill et al, 2021 ). In particular, the current COVID-19 pandemic has called on efforts on the development of recombinant protein-based vaccines and therapies.…”